My parish has large projection screens. We use those to project music. The church is circular, so the screens are off to the side and don't compete with the sanctuary.

I was ambivalent about screens, but they have been very useful over the past twelve months. I can display up to four staff lines of modern or chant musical notation and lyrics on each slide at a size that's comfortable for people to read from the opposite end of the church. A volunteer advances the slides during songs.

Single use worship aids, booklet format, 8.5x11 paper. I print readings, hymns, service music, creed, antiphons and st Michael prayer.

Little_Durufle - a limited number of familiar hymn tunes - any idea how the PIPs felt about that?

We're not allowed hymnals, missalettes, or worship aids; and the people aren't supposed to sing anything...Yet we're REQUIRED to have the Annual Catholic Appeal envelopes and pens in every pew. I will let you divine what ye will from that.

I've simply been doing the Propers plus familiar chant ordinaries: the people sing quietly along with those. Unfortunately, those who were once the most robust congregational singers are now the most vocally (no pun intended) anti-singing.

We’ve had comprehensive, proper weekly bulletins. Everything is in there – readings, hymns, prayers, Eucharistic Prayer, everything. Congregational singing is forbidden by our diocese; all music is sung by the quartet, masked and distanced by 12’. However, notation for what was once considered “congregational” music (ordinary, hymns, etc.) is included, along with the rubric “sung by the choir.” That way, the (reduced) number in the pews are reminded that the choir is singing the hymns on their behalf, and they ought not to sing, while the people watching at home who have downloaded the bulletin have what they need to sing along to their hearts’ content.

Congregational singing is highly discouraged here due to covid, so there are no missalettes. At my mother's funeral a few weeks ago, we all sang in the pews with our masks on. Most of us are cantors for Mass so we know the hymns by heart. It probably freaked Father out, but my mother sang at our father's funeral so we were surely going to sing for her.

If the lectors speak clearly and annunciate properly, no one needs a missalette. We should be watching father at the Eucharistic Prayer, not following along in a book. Everyone knows the 'Our Father'. A pew card with the propers should be all that's needed.

Many parishes are served by priests with heavy foreign accents and having the text in front of you is helpful.

I'm sorry, I just realized I meant a pew card with the ordinaries, not the propers.

I've long failed to see how there is any risk whatsoever posed by single-use worship aids, and yet even those weren't permitted for a while. It makes absolutely no sense. (Then again, this is true for almost all of what's been happening...) Fortunately we've been permitted to have worship aids (as long as they are single use) for quite some time.

We've controlled entrance to church through a single portal so that congregants can be directed to ushers to intelligently pack the pews to fit as many people as possible whilst still maintaining a modicum of social distancing. Since they all come in a single door, I place a podium with a white basket on top at that entrance to the nave so people can grab a worship aid as they come in. We then have a second set of special grey bins at each exit with large signs printed in red which tell people to recycle their used worship aids in them as they leave. Now that the parish has acquired this new habit, it's working out very well. I don't have to touch any of the used worship aids (I'm not worried anyway, tbh); I simply go around to each of the doors after the weekend is over and dump each basket into a recycle bin and we're done.

I am particularly blessed, however, as far as worship aid creation is concerned. I enjoy the graphic design element of making them (I'm a nerd for both type-setting text and music engraving, so this is right up my alley) and I'm blessed to have a copy machine for my exclusive use in my office, and I inherited a paper folding machine from a previous job which is now my personal property. Consequently, I've got it about as good as it gets as far as processing and creating worship aids is concerned. It's one of my favorite parts of my job. I make them, print them, fold them, etc. at the beginning of every week. We have parishioners who own a print shop and they will do special projects for us, like when we created laminated pew cards of the ordinary (currently not in use). They also supply us nice & thick 11x17 paper for the worship aids essentially at cost.

ServiamScores,

I am perplexed by the controlled entrance and exit of my parish - one way in and a separate one way out. What sense does it make to have the entire cathedral exit through the same door? We all crowd around each other as we leave. Wouldn’t it make more sense just to open all entrances/exits?

z09- I totally agree.

I am perplexed by the controlled entrance and exit of my parish - one way in and a separate one way out. What sense does it make to have the entire cathedral exit through the same door? We all crowd around each other as we leave. Wouldn’t it make more sense just to open all entrances/exits?

In theory, it prevents people from crossing paths.

Some of these restrictions are annoying insofar as we have known for a long time that contaminated surfaces are not the way that the virus primarily spreads — far from it, in fact — and while I can sort of understand restrictions on singing, nevertheless, I hold that such is abhorrent and must only come from the church. The civil authorities have no power to dictate what may or may not as far as the actual celebration of Mass goes, though I could see them having a say in one-way aisles and exits and in attempting to require some form of separation or even masks, but ultimately the church must agree to those. In any case, the solutions put in place strike me as very high-church Protestant in the worst ways, even if there was no real choice for many people here.